Do Guardian Angels Exist? Investigating Our Invisible Companions

"It's really fast," added his son, Jordan. "I saw it just coming towards me and I couldn't do anything and, finally, my goggles ripped off. Then I had snow coming down my throat and I couldn't breathe for 15 seconds."

But instead of being paralyzed by his claustrophobia, Marty's mind delivered an even more chilling vision and a reason to fight his way free.

"I could see myself literally at Denver International Airport, out on the tarmac, watching my son, watching him going in an old-fashioned pine box being slid into the back of a 757," he said. "I could see it very clearly.

Driven by the haunting image, Hodges battled through the snow and was able to search for and then reunite with his sons.

In the end, all of these cases remind us that it can be a very rough universe out there. To survive it, a little help from our guardian angels just might be essential.

"Humans are very resilient creatures," Geiger said. "I think that the basis of that resilience, in part, is this capacity, this sense that we are not alone."